Friday, 15 March 2013

Try, for a moment, to lay aside your prejudices and presuppositions and give
this a read. Bear in mind the article in question is written by secular,
atheistic scientists who, none the less, find intelligent design within the
genome. This article is going to sound like a cannon blast through the
scientific world.

Here's a new paper that can be added to the growing stack of
intelligent-design articles in peer-reviewed journals. Even though the authors
do not use the phrase "intelligent design," their reasoning centers on the
detection of an intelligent signal embedded in the genetic code -- a
mathematical and semantic message that cannot be accounted for by a natural
cause, "be it Darwinian, Lamarckian," chemical affinities or energetics, or any
other.

Dr. Vladimir I. shCherbak, a mathematician at the al-Farabi Kazakh National
University of Kazakhstan, and Maxim A. Makukov, an astrobiologist at
Kazakhstan's's Fesenkov Astrophysical Institute, gave their paper a catchy
title: "The 'Wow! signal' of the terrestrial genetic code." Their
paper has been accepted for publication in the prestigious planetary science
journal Icarus, where it's already available online.

Their title comes from a curious SETI signal back in 1977 that looked so
artificial at first, a researcher wrote "Wow!" next to it. With no follow-up
examples, that signal has remained interesting but inconclusive. shCherbak and
Makukov looked into "biological SETI" -- the "biological channel" of
communication (e.g., DNA) and concluded "Wow!" -- the genetic code has features
that defy natural explanation. The abstract states:

It has been repeatedly proposed to expand the scope for SETI, and
one of the suggested alternatives to radio is the biological
media. Genomic DNA is already used on Earth to store
non-biological information. Though smaller in capacity, but stronger in
noise immunity is the genetic code. The code is a flexible
mapping between codons and amino acids, and this flexibility allows modifying
the code artificially. But once fixed, the code might stay unchanged over
cosmological timescales; in fact, it is the most durable construct
known. Therefore it represents an exceptionally reliable
storage for an intelligent signature, if that conforms to biological
and thermodynamic requirements. As the actual scenario for the origin of
terrestrial life is far from being settled, the proposal that it might have been
seeded intentionally cannot be ruled out. A
statisticallystrongintelligent-like "signal" in the genetic code is then a
testable consequence of such scenario. (Emphasis added.)

Since intelligent design theory doesn't consider the question of the identity
of the designer, design by space aliens is one possible intelligent cause;
however, the phrase used here, "seeded intentionally," would appear to refer to
a broader class of intelligence(s).

Here we show that the terrestrial code displays a thorough
precision-type orderliness matching the criteria to be considered an
informational signal. Simple arrangements of the code reveal an
ensemble of arithmetical and ideographical patterns of the
same symbolic language. Accurate and systematic, these
underlying patterns appear as a product of precision logic and
nontrivial computing rather than of stochastic processes (the null
hypothesis that they are due to chance coupled with presumable
evolutionary pathways is rejected with P-value < 10-13). The patterns display
readily recognizable hallmarks of artificiality, among which are the
symbol of zero, the privileged decimal syntax and
semantical symmetries. Besides, extraction of the signal involves
logically straightforwardbutabstract operations, making the patterns essentially
irreducible to natural origin. Plausible ways of embedding the
signal into the code and possible interpretation of its content are discussed.
Overall, while the code is nearly optimized biologically, its limited
capacity is used extremely efficiently to pass non-biological
information.

From there, the authors explore a number of fascinating patterns they find in
the genetic code itself (not necessarily in animal genomes) -- i.e., the
relationship between the base pairs of DNA and the 20 amino acids. They are
driven to the conclusion of design not only by what they observe, but also "by
the fact that how the code came to be apparently non-random and nearly
optimized remains disputable and highly speculative." This reasoning is
similar to Stephen Meyer's in Signature in the Cell in which all the possible
natural causes for a phenomenon were considered before inferring design.

The signal of intelligent origin, they reasoned, was strong because both
arithmetic and ideographic signals are apparent, both using the same symbolic
language. They predicted that a signal, if it exists, should be robust from
modification. They did their best to avoid arbitrariness, considering what
natural causes could be available to explain their findings. They identified two
dimensionless integers -- redundancy of codons and number of nucleons in the
amino acid set -- as "ostensive numerals" forming the basis of the signal,
showing in detail how the patterns in those numerals satisfy the conditions for
intelligent signals.

Considerations of brevity prohibit giving a complete analysis of their
arguments, but let an example suffice. Of the 20 amino acids, only proline holds
its side chain with two bonds, and has one less hydrogen in its block. The
effect of this is to "standardize" the code to a 73 + 1 block nucleon number.
Yet the distinction between block and chain is "purely formal," they argue,
since there is no stage in amino acid synthesis where the block and side chain
are detached. Here's their comment:

Therefore, there is no any [sic] natural reason why nucleon
transfer in proline; it can be stimulated only in the mind of a
recipient to achieve the array of amino acids with uniform structure.
Such nucleon transfer thus appears artificial. However,
exactly, this seems to be its destination: it protects the patterns from
any natural explanation.Minimizing the
chances for appealing to natural origin is a distinct
concern of messaging of such kind, and this problem seems to be
solved perfectly for the signal in the genetic code. Applied
systematically without exceptions, the artificial transfer in
proline enables holistic and precise order in
the code. Thus, it acts as an "activation key".While nature
deals with the actual proline which does not produce the signal in
thecode,an intelligent recipient easily finds the key and reads messages
in arithmetical language....

In addition, they find a decimal system including zero (via stop codons), and
many other fascinating signs of intelligent origin. They examine possible
criticisms, such as the claim that the patterns could be due to unknown natural
causes:

But this criterion is equivalent to asking if it is possible
at all to embed informational patterns into the code so that they could
be unequivocally interpreted as an intelligent signature. The
answer seems to be yes, and one way to do so is to make patterns
virtual, not actual. Exactly that is observed in the genetic
code. Strict balances and decimal syntax appear only with the
application of the "activation key".

In effect, the proline nucleon transfer is like a decoder ring that makes the
signal apparent and all the blocks balance out. Some other signs of
artificiality are the fact that nucleon sums are multiples of 037; the stop
codons act as zero in a decimal system, and all the three-digit decimals (111,
222, 333, 444, 555, 666, 777, 888, and 999) appear at least once in the code,
"which also looks like an intentional feature."

Could these patterns be due to selection or any other natural process? Could
they be mere "epiphenomena" of chemical pressures for mass equalities, or
something else?

But it is hardly imaginable how a natural process can drive
mass distribution in abstract representationsof the code where codons
are decomposed into bases or contracted by redundancy.... no natural
process can drive mass distribution to produce the balance ... amino
acids and syntactic signs that make up this balance are entirely
abstract since they are produced by translation of a string
read across codons.

Even more convincing, no natural cause can produce semantics -- particularly
the kind involving "interpretive or linguistic semantics peculiar to
intelligence," they write. "Exactly the latter kind of
semantics is revealed in the signal of the genetic code." Here's a
summary of the patterns they conclude show design:

In total, not only the signal itself reveals
intelligent-like features -- strict nucleon equalities, their distinctive
decimal notation, logical transformations accompanying the equalities, the
symbol of zero and semantic symmetries, but the very method of its
extractioninvolves abstract operations -- consideration of idealized
(free and unmodified) molecules, distinction between their blocks and chains,
the activation key, contraction and decomposition of codons. We find
that taken together all these aspects point at artificial nature of the
patterns.

Lest anyone perceive a creationist message, they write: "Whatever the
actual reason behind the decimal system in the code, it
appears that it was invented outside the solar
system already several billions years [sic] ago." In other
words, their favored position is panspermia. (Keep in mind, though, that there
are multiple versions of panspermia.)

If their thesis of "biological SETI" sounds a little like ideas floated by
Paul Davies, the authors thank Davies in their Acknowledgements, along with
Manfred Eigen in Germany.

How will evolutionists respond to this paper? It's hard to see how they could
dismiss it. Maybe they will try to mock it as old Arabian numerology, or
religiously inspired (since Kazakhstan, which funded the study, is 70% Muslim).
Those would be unfair criticisms. The authors have Russian names, certified
doctorates, and wrote in collaboration with leading lights in the West. Or
perhaps critics could argue that the authors hail from a foreign country whose
name has too many adjacent consonants in it to take them seriously.

No, it appears the only way out for Darwinists would be the "Dawkins Dodge."
You may remember that one from the documentary Expelled,
where Dawkins admits the possibility of panspermia for Earth, so long as the
designers themselves evolved by a Darwinian process.

What's most notable about this paper is the similarity in design reasoning
between the authors and the more familiar advocates of intelligent design
theory. No appeals to religion or religious texts; no identifying the designer;
just logical reasoning from effect to sufficient cause. The authors even applied
the "design filter" by considering chance and natural law, including natural
selection, before inferring design.

If Darwinists want to go on equating intelligent design with creationism,
they will now have to take on the very secular journal Icarus.

I am not now nor have I ever been a member of Facebook. Nor will I ever
become I member or user of Facebook. Frankly I am considering eliminating my
Blogger page, quitting here, and all but eliminating my online presence but that
is a different story.

Tonight I received an email from a friend of Tess' which came through
Facebook asking me to sign up and view her page. Nor will I ever ... well, you
get the idea.

But this one came with an option whereby I could "unsubscibe" from any future
mailings from Facebook or its users. I clicked it. But why should I have to? Why
should I have to to opt out of a service I have never used? Why should I have to
click a link to keep stupid people from using my email address?

The Internet has become way too intrusive. Never mind the fact that 95% of
the people that use it are dumber than a turnip, never mind that it is primarily
pornography and filth, never mind that I am monitored every time I log in, never
mind that most of what you read on the Internet is simply not true,

I am getting really fed up.

I am also getting fed up with the bunch of crooks that are members of the
Obama administration. Look, it is quite simple. The enemy isn't on the
battlefield of Iraq. They are in the White House. If you do not understand that
you shouldn't be voting. If you support that man you need to educate yourself.
This isn't politics. This isn't left versus right. This is criminality and
treason.

Look, you have an administration that has refused to rule out the use of
drones ... against you! Now they want to bring in a Secretary of Labor who
supports anti-blasphemy laws that would strip you of your 1st Amendment rights
and make it illegal to speak against Islam.

Oh, you say, that would never happen. Wake up, Moron. It is happening. Why
don't you check you the statements of the proposed Secretary? Why don't you
check out the clear facts that the Obama administration is supporting this in
the U.N.?